Chapter six of Bike Easy is all about the gentle art of pootling. You’re pootling when you pedal off, in an optimistic frame of mind, for a leisurely ride that can last for anything from an hour to a full day. Piece several pootles together and you have a cycling holiday. Pootlers choose routes on the basis of their beauty, the places of interest they pass through and the refreshment opportunities en route. They prefer quiet country lanes to busy A-roads, and they value comfort over speed. Pootlers are usually up for an unexpected detour to a place with an interesting name, or an extended lunch break.
Pootling is a popular pastime. When the great British public are surveyed about why they buy bicycles the main reason given is leisure and pleasure. On the face of it, this might seem surprising. We live in an extremely crowded country. Southern England in particular is one of the most populous places on the planet. In the UK as a whole there is one motor vehicle for every two inhabitants, and the number of miles driven is rising steadily year on year. Most of our towns and cities have been mucked about to try and absorb all this traffic, while the post-war explosion of housing estates, business parks and shopping malls have been designed on sprawling, Californian principles with car travel uppermost in mind. Measures that might encourage cycling have seldom made it off the drawing board.
And yet, despite these woes, opportunities for pootling are plentiful. There are still thousands of idyllic miles of road and lane and bridleway to be enjoyed and (at last!) more routes are being created. With a little research you can pick up lightly trafficked routes and specially made cycle tracks that rapidly leave the madding crowds behind. More>>>
